Live, Laugh, Love….

So its day two of my zed blogger challenge and I thought its Wednesday what better to write about that a female who inspires me. Now I won’t pretend to be deep and all that picking on someone whose name I can’t pronounce or spell right. No. I have decided to pick someone close to home. My big sister the beautiful 🙂 Luyando Haangala..

To some she is just some annoying loud little girl who jumps up and down in front of a camera making noise, to others she is a person they look at in awe and aspire to be like but for me she is my sister who is an amazing Mother to an even more amazing little girl, she is an amazing friend and she is an even more amazing sister.

the gorgeous Asante

What is so inspiring about her you may wonder? Her story. She may be an annoying loud little girl who jumps up and down in front of a camera making noise, but she had a dream to get behind the camera and she worked hard until she got that dream. I would like to go into depth about her struggle to get where she is today which is as one of the few delegates selected to the Washington Young African Leaders Fellowship, but I am not sure she would permit me to do so. She is probably saving that for her memoirs and I would not want to preempt that ;-).

I remember her singing when she was 5 years old, in an off key voice of course (not every 5 year old is blessed with talent at that early age) but she knew what she wanted and guess what that 5 year old ended up being invited to sing for Zambia’s 1st Republican President!!!

the five year old with a voice that sings off key and a dream!!!

When she came back to Zambia, she had a dream of a future she wanted, many looked at her as a dreamer, others, laughed her off, others helped 🙂 and now she is slowly but surely watching her dreams come to light.

Walt Disney said “All our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them.” I am grateful for my sister because she gives me the courage to pursue my dreams. She truly makes me believe that impossible is nothing.

well I honestly dont know where to start from ey, I am taking part in the Zed blogger challenge and gosh in the last couple month I have been slacking… apologies Martha , I promise to do better. Anyway this month’s zed blogger challenge is five days of blogging and I was honestly stomped on what to blog about and whether I had enough juice to blog for five straight days but what the heck, I decided to give it a try.

Today I made a decision. A decision to let go and let God. Yes we all say this but after a couple of things not going my way, I realized it was just a couple of things that did not go my way. If I had to count the number of things that did go my way, well, I stopped and apologized to God for ever doubting what he has in store for me. After a conversation with my Dad this morning, I realized that my faith in God is not as big as it should be. I am only human and I do believe he is their in the back ground pulling the strings of my life ensuring every thing falls into place, turning no’s into yeses 🙂 and I am grateful. As stated I am only human and want to get things done at a certain speed but time and time again, he teaches me that my time is not his time. He always blesses me abundantly and his mercies are new everyday and all this is done in his time. So now I am waiting on his time and suddenly things are a tad bit brighter. It is a terrific Tuesday and I am a Zed blogger!!!

When I received the challenge for this month, I must say I was quite excited when I opened my mail and found it was an email from Martha, until I opened the email and I read it over and over and over and over again and I came up empty…. I was struggling to find what inspires me to write down my thoughts, to find my muse…I always say I am not the most creative person on the planet, in fact all my blog entries are nothing creative just me writing what I know personal experiences and all… thus the struggle to find what inspires me… I looked up the word muse, it is a mythical creature that inspired literature, poetry blah blah blah and for some reason certain works portray muses as being sex goddesses and I can definitely say without a doubt that I do not have that!!!!! LOL…

My inspiration to blog, to write or to whip up something magical in the kitchen (yes cooking is art too!!!!) is self preservation if I am being honest. Its simply me trying to find a way not to let my thoughts and emotions bubble over and lead me into a downward spiral of depression and despair…lol…

So unless there is such a thing as inspiring yourself to write and I dont think such a thing exsits, lol, muses in my life are mythical..

Those are my two cents on the matter, my name is Lweendo and #Iamazedblogger

I should have posted this yesterday but its been a busy month so hopefully, Martha will bear with me and allow a late post for the January blogger challenge :)..

I received my first award nomination for the year 2014 from and Jane I must say I am pretty excited to put Lupita Nyongo to shame on the Red Carpert.. Whats that? there will be no official event?? *sighs* lol… anyway I was asked to answer the following questions below…

1. What do you think of the crop-top trend?

I love it and really wish I had the body to pull it off.. Chances are by the time I get the body to pull it off, it will be out of fashion 😦 2. If you could have any super-power, what would it be?

hmmmmm this is a tough one… permission to pass? thanks!!! All I know is that I would like to do good, to do something that matters. 3. Vampires or werewolves?

A home made smoothie comprising apples, pineapples, strawberries.. whatever fruit is available in the house really. 6. When was the last time you broke a sweat and why?

About three weeks ago when I was trying to exercise. I am fighting the post-pregnancy baby weight battle at the moment 7. What was your best accomplishment of 2013 and why?

The birth of my Son (yes I am one of those Mom’s who cant shut up about their offspring). He is such a blessing in my life and I am lucky to have him. 8. What does loyalty mean to you?

Wow, this is quite the loaded question ey. ummmm loyalty, for me it means a few more words that are seemingly void of definition as they are more feeling than anything.. that is trust, honesty, love…. those are the three words that come to mind…

9. How many pairs of shoes do you own?

errrr well I cant count on both hands, thats a good thing right? about 20 maybe lol paltry for a female I know. 10. What dish are you super great at making?

Oooooo I love cooking in fact 2014 will be spent perfecting the skill.But right now I am good at all things Chicken really. I make a pretty mean roast chicken.. 11. Why do you blog?

I find writing as a healthy form of release of any emotion be it anger, happiness, frustration or sadness. The fact that someone out there gets to read my nonsense is quite the bonus.

So in accordance with the rules, I must nominate people and give them questions so here goes…

I received my first #IAmAZedBlogger challenge for the month of January and I must say I was quite excited.. The challenge was to do something new and well write about it.. Well, I couldn’t think of a more befitting subject than my journey into the beautiful thing that is motherhood…

I met my son on the 25th of September 2013 and my life hasn’t been the same since, in a good way :-). Because of him I have experienced a lot of firsts like the first smile, the first poop diaper, yes even that was fun!!!!! Lol…. Anyway, I’m looking forward to many more firsts with him xx……

I haven’t done a weekly photo challenge in a very long time but decided to participate in this weeks.. This year my son who is my new found joy was born.. This is a picture of me and him they say a picture is worth a thousand words in my opinion this one is pricesless….

I always try to start a blog with a smart opening line so as to captivate the reader, or put a smart tag here or there to grab peoples attention and get more views and blah blah blah.. None of that here I’m just gonna go straight to the point cause this is something I’m actually quite excited about. Not that my other blog posts don’t excite me…. Lol.. Anyway recently came across a blog post from one of the blogs I follow Miss Kundwe, if I wasn’t using my phone I would have posted a link to the said post.. No that’s a lie I have just forgotten Lol… But here is a direct link which you can use ONLY AFTER you are done reading this one :-). Anyway so it was a little project called #IAmAZedBlogger.. Every artist needs some sort of muse and direction yes? Yes! This comes at quite the perfect time cause I have been slacking in the bloggosphere, hmmm is that a word? Oh well, in my world it is.. So slacking basically because I’m not ready to ‘journal’ my life for the ‘whole world’ to read so to be able to write with direction is something I’m quite looking foward to.. Additionally I get to meet and read a lot of blogs from fellow Zambians, they are quite a few out there we could have a little ‘artist’ blog party.. Lol.. Anyway all I wanted to say is Hi, my name is Lweendo and #IAmAZedBlogger 🙂

I dont know where to start this post from to be honest. I havent blogged in a while because well so much has been going on in my life most of which I wanted to keep to myself and you know how they say ‘a good writer, will always write what they know’ or someyhing like that. . And as a person who found solace in writing, you can imagine what I kept bottled up. I scribbled here and there but it was never enough.
Anyway, like I said so I much has happened in my life in this past year and I have had a lot of shoulda woulda coulda moments. To say its been a bitter-sweet year would be grossly understating the fact. For the longest time I felt alone and like I couldnt turn to anyone. My life was somewhat spiralling, my emotional health something to be desired. All I wanted was refuge, someone who could be there for me without judgement, no questions asked anytime of the day but the one person I thought could be my refuge could not be my refuge anymore. And it was quite a rocky road I was on.
I have done alot in my life. Some things I’m not so proud of others make me beam just at the thought of them. Hurt some people, gotten hurt along the way but I guess such is the cycle of life and growth. I grew alot this year and it wasn’t easy to accept certain things in my life happened for a reason, so I prayed about it and moved on… I feel like I’m rambling and not making much sense now lol..
And then on 25 th september my life changed. My refuge was born. My son,my whole life. . Now I know what you are thinking how is this refuge? He cant exactly talk back to me when I need to talk to be someone but whenever I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders I look at him and the tears disappear and so does the heaviness in my heart. I may have done alot of wrong things in my life but out of all the wrong he is the one thing I feel I got spot on. My refuge is heaven sent♥

No, I’m not talking about what its like on the other side cause frankly, I wouldn’t know though my physio-therapist after I described what had happened in the accident told me that the brief seconds I was blacked out is what death felt like, but how would he know right?? I’m talking about those of us left behind after the death to feel the pain of loss and struggle to no avail to fill the gap left by the one we have lost. Sometimes, depending on who we lose, they take with them our will to live.

Many a time we lament on how we wish we could have had more time and how there is so much we cud have wanted to say that wasn’t said, so much you wanted to do that wasn’t done. I remember, when my grandfather died at the ripe old age of eighty-something I wasn’t crying cause of what I wished we could have done but didn’t but more so that I had lost my grandfather, its like an a very old person dies, its inevitable do you celebrate their life more than mourn for the loss of it. However when someone from our generation or younger dies, the story is different.

This morning I woke up to the news that my ex-boyfriend, the 1st guy I actually had a serious relationship with had died after being ill. I felt broken. To say we were friends would be stretching the truth we were more of acquitances after we broke up, we got along yes, but I remember how last time we spoke, I snapped at him cause he irritated me and I actually deleted him off my BBM list, I kept telling myself that I should talk to him and apologising for snapping cause we females do have the tendency tobe irrational but just kept saying, I’ll do it, I’ll do it cept now he is dead and I never got the chance. RIP Bwalya.

It got me to thinking, cause I kept lamenting on the things I wanted to say that I didn’t say, why do we live our lives like that?? Where its only when the person departs from this world that we cry about the things we wanted to say, things we wanted to do and all that. It made me resolve to live each day fulfilled, saying all I need to say, doing all I need to do, making memories with the people I love so that when either you or I eventually depart from this world, instead of mourning about how we didn’t get enuff time together, we wonder where we found the time to do all that we did so that even after death, life will continue.

So, I’m sitting here, waiting for the salon to open, its bout 8am having a bowl of fruit salad which let’s be honest is just a couple of chopped up apples and a sliced banana with just a dash of pineapple but oh well,you know what they say an apple a day!

Of late I have found myself to be well, quite unhappy I have had to go through so much the past couple months and I generally just haven’t known how to deal. I read a blog from a friend of mine the other day and one of her posts was a reflection on the mistakes she had made and how she was probably still gonna make more than a handful that got me thinking, I made mistakes, I’m gonna make a thousand more, will I let each mistake get me down?? That’s like a lot of unhappiness for one to deal with in a life time me thinks.

One thing that irks me is how people brand themselves as understanding until faced with a real life situation in which you expect them to understand instead you find yourself on the receiving end of hostility.

*side thought*, I really don’t like apples, so having to dig thru a bowl full of apples is nothing short of torture I swear. Only reason I’m eating is cause I’m paying for these errrrr apples.

I really need to get into the habit of jotting down my thoughts, cause this week I had so much to say just no time to write it down but now I’m blank hmmmmmm oh well, guess until next time, xoxo L.

Goodreads

T’Challa, after the death of his father, the King of Wakanda, returns home to the isolated, technologically advanced African nation to succeed to the throne and take his rightful place as king. Imdb.com